Jim D. Adkisson: Insanity or hate crime?

So this guy hates liberals so he walks into a Universalist-Unitarian Church and starts blowing people away.... sure that's crazy and people who buy all that Neo-con.... limpballs shit are insane BUT.... I'm torn between PROVING that in a court of law and making it clear that "NO, you can't murder people because of their color, religion, sexual orientation OR political beliefs."

The defense is entering an insanity plea,.... But I don't know..... I feel like the prosecutor should push for a hate crime trial.... even if he/she doesn't get it the words will have at least been said in court.

How many sites, books, shows, neo-con freaks advocate violence against us? Imagine how they'll lash out when we completely control the government again.....

Thoughts? Opinions?

A week before his attack. He also got the shotgun he used in the attack about a month before the attack.

He planned this in advance, so he's not insane.

He acted out his hateful political and religious beliefs and showed an incredible lack of humanity and common sense.

But he is clearly not insane in the legal sense.

....for reasons that have no personal relationship to you... the people I mean

The hate crime law on the federal level and in most states does not include political philosophy as a protected class. So if this guy was shooting Unitarians it would be a hate crime. Religion is a protected class. But if he was killing liberals. Its not a hate crime because political belief is not a protected class.

Let me see if i can name California's since I am on the Hate Crimes Task Force for Los Angeles County. Race, Religion, Ethnicity, Ancestry, National Origin,Disability, Gender, Sexual Orientation.

So a good defense attorney can make this guy skate on the hate crime charges unfortunately. :mad:

listener to Rush Limbaugh and his clones?

Gee ... that would cause Republicans to propose a constitutional amendment allowing insane people the right to vote ... twice ...

The urge to kill is natural. Killing is not evidence of madness, but of giving in to that natural urge.

The ability to distinguish right from wrong. Adkisson clearly expected to be blown away by the cops at the end of his violent rampage, which indicates that he knew that what he was going to do was wrong. So insanity would be nearly impossible to prove as a defense.

But I hope he gets the best defense possible, even though he figured he wouldn't need one. Too bad that unarmed bunch of latte-sipping, Volvo-driving liberal pantywaists took him and his big bad guns down without firing a shot and left him alive to answer for his crimes. Probably just ruined his whole day.

I think I'll send his defense team a contribution.

From what has been presented, this dude's entire life has been one big hate crime. Hate radio didn't plant the seeds of this hatred, it just comforted and re-inforced it. His prejudices were deep-seated and one that it appears was obvious to many who he encountered...a ticking time bomb...but one that people avoided rather than confront and help.

Was his hatred a cause of his insanity or was it the cause of a life of failure? And is that "insane"? Or is that just an extreme case of frustration and hatred that has been allowed to fester in this country...preyed upon by politicians and other goons.

There's a case to say that any murder is a hate crime...but I'll reserve judgement until we get more details that will come out in any forthcoming trial.

Cheers...

Legally, though, I think the definition of insanity is that he didn't know what he was doing or that he could not distinguish between right and wrong.

"Hate crimes" trivializes the matter. Call them what they really are: acts of domestic terrorism.